Maybe use a chain winch or hoist that they use in industrial applications whereby almost anyone of any stature can lift a great deal of weight with a pull of a chain and then let it slowly descend to generate electricity!

"W'y, Miss," answered Jack Molloy, who chanced to be sitting on a spare yard close at hand working a Turk's head on a manrope, "that's the steam-winch, that is the thing wot we uses w'en we wants to hoist things out o 'the hold, or lower 'em into it."